How to Prepare Your Business for 2016

Moving Forward: The Trending Market 2016 is shaping up to be an interesting year with a continued emphasis on social media activity, an exciting economic future, and promising spending trends. If you haven’t already, it is an absolute must to establish active profiles on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, which will become increasingly important as social media companies expand and consumers continue to make buying choices based on the content. Concerning the economy, there are varied projections concerning what it will look like in the near future, but the consensus is largely optimistic that the economy remains healthy and growing as unemployment rates steadily decrease and consumer spending remains stable. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) projected that the global economy will grow by 3.1 percent in 2016–a modest improvement, but decidedly stable, nonetheless. Backing up this figure, Fortune magazine predicted in their December issue, “ a slow but steady global economic …

talkroute on hold music

6 Ways to Better Serve Callers on Hold

  1. Keep Your Caller Informed First and foremost, your caller will be much more comfortable on hold when they know exactly what to expect. As soon as the call connects, customers should be greeted with a clear, appropriate, and friendly voice, reassuring them that you are taking their call seriously. If possible, it’s also a plus to give them an estimated or average wait time until someone is going to pick up. Even if the waiting time you provide is off, it’s still way better than sitting there with phone in hand and no end in sight.   2. Use Quality Voiceovers for Your Hold Menus Concerning the voice a customer hears when they call your business, putting some extra effort into your voice recordings can go a long way to improve the caller’s experience. Ever seen Wargames? That movie from the 80s where Matthew Broderick’s computer talks back …

Startup vs. Small Business: Which One Are You?

Startups and small businesses are born of the same lineage, but they differ in as many ways as they are similar. Depending on who you ask, you will hear that the 2 are either synonymous, or completely unique; nevertheless, there is a reason for different titles. So which type of business do you have—and what does it mean for you? Here we take a look at the key characteristics of the two types to find out what defines you as a startup, or a small business. Startup vs. Small Business: Primary Motivations It is generally held that a startup sets out with an ambitious idea and intends to “break in” to the business world by inventing or reinventing a market for itself. A small business, on the other hand, generally intends to find its own place in a niche or large, existing market, such as those staples of the economy: …

Why Some Blog Experts Have Deleted The Comments Section

If you own a business, then you probably have a website; if your business has a website, then it probably contains some kind of a blog. A blog can be a tremendous delivery system to educate your customers, promote your content, and bring in new business. There is, however, one element that a lot of heavy-hitters in the blogosphere are calling into question—the comments section. Here’s why. It’s Tough to Moderate Creating a conversation about the subject matter in your content is all well and good… actually, it’s really well and really good—it keeps us honest and helps us stay connected with potential customers. The thing is, we may have unwittingly created a monster. People commenting on the material can be ill-advised, mislead, and even mean-spirited. One person does not represent an entire community, but that one commenter can easily influence the whole group and completely distort what was actually …

How to Stay Sane While Running a Home Business This Winter

When you work from home in the winter, make no mistake—you are in a fight. You are in a fight with your natural tendency to give into laziness and stop working; you are in a fight with the elements outside that keep you locked up in the house. Learn how to take control of each day and overwhelm this resistance, and you will find that you can still remain productive, even in the unforgiving winter months. Don’t Get Stuck In the House One of the greatest enemies of someone working at home is cabin fever. Once the workday is off and running and you’ve been glued to your desk for a couple of hours, the compulsion is to never leave your home office (that’s why you have a home business, after all). But in the cold, dreary months, it is vital to utilize every opportunity to leave the house, when …

11 Perfect Gifts from Your Business for Under $20

We all want our gifts to be unique; we want them to be interesting, and hopefully the recipient actually enjoys their present. The same goes for choosing something to give from your business, and this can take a lot of time, energy, and money. In the spirit of the season, we have done some of the legwork to hopefully give some of your time and money back to you. Here are 11 great items for your clients and staff on a modest budget, for under $20. 1. Staple-Less Stapler, $16 Compact and functional, comes in different colors—what’s not to like? It has a mechanism that folds the paper in on itself to create a solid binding; no metal staples to get caught in the carpet, and no refills necessary. 2. Tracking Tile, $25 There isn’t a person on earth who doesn’t need this. It’s just above the $20 mark, but …

Remote Employees: Are They Right for My Business?

Have you ever taken an online course for college? It can be a tough environment to work in, and as instructors routinely warn people who take such a course, it’s not for everyone. All of a student’s assignments, deadlines, and discussions are completely up to that individual to monitor and complete. When you employ a remote team, you are sort of a moderator of a big “online course”. There are many benefits to utilizing a remote team, including a larger pool of applicants to choose from, a potentially more efficient workforce, and an excuse to use some really fun telecommunication tools. There is definitely a learning curve if you’re new to it, though, so it’s good to be honest with yourself in deciding whether you can adjust to this kind of working environment. Can You Manage a Remote Team? There are benefits and disadvantages to having either type of team, …

6 Ways to Increase Revenue from Black Friday

  Black Friday is beginning to lose its salt—that is, this one day is becoming a whole season under the monikers, “Black Friday Season”, “Black November”, and others. A few years ago, maybe a decade, retailers began to institute a new holiday, a buying holiday that inspired shoppers to become professional deal-hunters, even to the point of craziness. This unofficial holiday has been going strong for a while now, but with early preparations by retailers to take advantage of their willing patrons and the onset of mass online shopping, the day after Thanksgiving has started to blur into a month or more of dedicated bargain-hunting.   1. Start Your Promotions Early If your business is to remain competitive this season, then you may have to consider offering special promotions and deals reserved for Black Friday, a little early. The online retail giant Amazon has already launched its preemptive strike to …

8 Ideas to Make Your Promotion Special During the Holiday Season

  Fall is a great time to put a little extra effort into promotion and make good use of hyper-stimulated consumers who are on the hunt for every deal they can find. November and December are the top months for holiday shopping, and not only can your business rise to the occasion, you can meet consumers where they are with a few targeted promotional strategies. Included in this article are just a few ideas to give you an edge in reaching your customers during the early holiday season, and as always, there are many more ways to go about it—all you have to do is use your imagination.   1. Mobile Optimization A survey conducted in October of this year by the National Retail Federation revealed that 21.4 percent of smartphone owners will use their device to make holiday purchases, and 47.5 percent will use smartphones to research products. This …

Marketing So Bad, That it’s Good

  Some of the best marketing was either purposely, or accidentally made to be ridiculous or just awful—and they made those businesses rich. Marketing doesn’t have to be perfect, it just has to strike a chord with people and grab their attention. Of course, this doesn’t always work. Surely, there have been innumerable companies who tried this tactic (or didn’t know what they were doing) and failed, but when it comes out just right, you might hit on that special something that makes people react. Here are a few instances of terrible marketing, which will go do in history as some of the best ideas every conceived.   Eagle Insurance Growing up with the Eagle Man commercials, most of us thought it was just another really bad, low-budget commercial (we had a lot of those in Chicago). But even now, we still remember the name and joke about it all …